Oil and Sand
by GryphonFledgling
Summary: "She had never known hunger, he had never felt trapped. He did not know how to be gentle, she did not know how to be rough." - A series of short pieces set along the Fury Road. Lots of characters, lots of situations.
1. Names

There had been other wives before them, whose shadows they had grown up in, learned how to be beautiful and pleasing and delicate. Wives whose names – both that they were born with and those that Joe forced upon them - were carved into the secret places of the prison, monuments and memorials to their lives, but whose names were forgotten when they were snatched and torn and taken to be milked. There, they were not wives anymore, and even they didn't remember themselves as they cooed and cradled little rag poppets that were their only comfort in the world. Even Miss Giddy didn't remember her old name, the one she'd had before she began to record their stories.

Splendid's name had been Angharad when she was born, and she had only kept it when she was brought before Joe because she had begged and pleaded and cried before him, her pretty little child's face screwed up in sparkling tears. It was how her place was cemented as favorite among his wives, even before she had been known by him. She had been eleven, weeping for her mother, and he had named her "The Spendid Angharad" as she knelt before him. But "Splendid" was the name he called her when she delighted him, when he wanted her, when he scolded her.

So, when she heard him call her name – "Angharad" – as she ran from him, as she fell and crushed his dreams as her ribs were crushed within her, she knew that she had won. He had caved to her, as he had always known who she was. He had _known_ that she was not his property, but he had tried to fool himself.

And so her name – her real name – was carried up to Valhalla or wherever the hell souls went when they were done.

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A/N: These are basically just little dribbles and scribbles that violently crash into my brain and demand to be written while holding me at metaphorical gunpoint. So I write them down and figured I'd share them.


	2. Hearts

The War Boys adored their cars the way fathers love their children, running them ragged and yet tucking them gently into their garages with gentle kisses and soft callused hands. Furiosa loved the War Rig the way children love their mothers, curling up into them and feeling the soft drumbeat of their heart after having everything demanded of them.

The Rig had protected her, had cradled her, had fought for her. It carried her within its warm belly and it nourished her with its milk and guzzoline.

She couldn't. She couldn't lose the only other mother she had ever known.

So when it let out a pained low moan as its tires sank into the rank sand and its axle twisted, she felt her heart twist the same way and her hands – both the hand that her birth mother had given her and the hand that the Rig had given her – went to save it. She knew there was nothing she could do – sinew and bone could not budge the tons and tons of steel and oil – but she couldn't do _nothing._ And so she pushed, her feet being sucked into the sand alongside the Rig, because it was the only thing she could think to do while her brain screamed alongside the wheels.

And then the Fool and the War Boy had the winch, their desperation born of necessity rather than love, their heads clear even if their hands were shaking. The Rig cried out again as it hauled itself from its trench, the noise a murmur of reassurance, a lullaby made up of squealing belts. Of course it would never leave her, never abandon her, never die.

She wouldn't let it.

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 _A/N:_ _I swear, I could write family!fic of Furiosa and the Rig all day._


	3. Love

They were not versed in the ways of love – him a past child of war and her a future mother of hate. They had never known a gentle caress or a inconsequential fight, never known what it meant to actually want to be with someone, rather than just tolerate the presence of those with whom they were forced into company. Barry and Larry, the other Wives, they were close, they were home and family, but there was no other choice. Learning about another person, about another soul, one who was chosen, that was strange.

She had never known hunger, he had never felt trapped. He did not know how to be gentle, she did not know how to be rough. Her fingers were too light on his skin, butterfly kisses that made him tickle and itch. His shoulders were too strained with muscle and he nearly crushed her the first time he held her. They were from two different worlds with different scars, but their common purpose was to be disposable.

They loved like broken children, in silent moments with only their fingers touching, or curled into each other and speaking of everything and nothing. It was new and it was frightening and it was good.


	4. Back

They found The Ace first. He was half buried in the sand, only his hump and one gnarled arm protruding. Furiosa pulled him out herself. She touched her forehead to his broken one, the shattered glass of his goggles brushing her cheek. She had done this to him. She had known what would happen. She had thrown away her second's life for some little girls.

She didn't place him on the truck. He would have wanted it this way. When the war boys fell, they stayed fallen. She arranged his body facing the east so the sun could take him to Valhalla, ignoring the silent judgment of the crew. Then she left him.

They would not leave the others.

Angharad was next, her body sprawled and cut open to dry in the sun. Miss Giddy was curled over her as if to protect her, the storykeeper's tattoos illegible beneath the bloody results of crow beaks. Cheedo ran her hands through Anharad's tangled hair and traced Miss Giddy's arm, weeping quietly.

They laid them together, wrapped in a sheet from the wives' room. It had been bleached of the warlord's influence and christened again with the crust of those free of him. The war boys would not touch them, muttering about ghosts. After all, war boys did not come back. When war boys fell, they stayed fallen. Death was a given, was glorious, but you did not keep it close. Toast silenced them with a vicious look marred by her own wet lashes. She did not touch the cloth, but she stood guard over it with her hand twisted into a fist.

Even though they had been last, they found the Mothers next. The Dag brushed each of their bodies gently with her crooked fingers, murmuring a prayer, while those Mothers who had survived caught and cradled their sisters' souls.

Amongst each set of folded arms, they placed a piece of their bikes, the last remnant of their home. These the crew were fascinated by, staying a respectful distance away but examining the bits of metal and cloth. They had never seen mothers such as these before they had appeared on the lift, invincible and proud. These were mothers worth of Valhalla and so they were saluted with silent linked hands.

The Rig lay crumpled beneath the valley walls. The war boys mourned with howls and chants, their war machine destroyed, its guts strewn out before it on the sand. Capable ignored all of them, burning her hands as she climbed its skeleton to peer into its eyes. She did not cry out when she found Nux's mangled body, nor did she weep as she helped collect his pieces. She had witnessed him, already brought him back with her. There was no need for anything else. So he was another War Boy left where he fell. There was no War Boy left.

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A/N: I promise I have cheerier works where maybe some characters live.


End file.
